53. Emily

53

EMILY

T he moment I stepped over the threshold that separated the hallway from my bedroom, I dropped my bag on the floor and stared at the different piles of lingerie meticulously laid out across my comforter, my off-brand sheets replaced by layers of red silk. Before glancing around the rest of the space. Nothing else appeared to be touched or taken and the front door to my tiny condo was exactly how I'd left it this morning. Locked.

I waited for that surge of fear to flood my system and send my fight-or-flight instincts into overdrive. Instead, my feet were sliding across the plush carpet, my curiosity propelling me closer and closer to the piles of lace and satin. I trailed a finger over the white almost see-through bodysuit, the black babydoll-looking nightgown, and the light-pink one-piece teddy before landing on the blue camisole and matching booty shorts. None of it was made for comfort and it certainly wasn't the type of underwear I would have chosen for myself. But it all appeared to be in my size—a fact that should have been alarming.

It wasn't. I was no final girl. I was the chick who got murdered five seconds into the opening scene. And some dark part of me was okay with that.

I glanced over my shoulder, towards the empty doorway, then back to the bed again. Snatching up the blue set, even though everything in me screamed to do the opposite. To lean into my natural defiance that urged me to throw on a pair of gray sweats and my favorite band t-shirt—the one I had since high school with all the holes in it.

A quick shower and a swipe of pink lip gloss later, I was on my hands and knees, climbing onto my double bed like a sacrificial lamb waiting for the slaughter. No idea whether or not I was about to be fucked into oblivion or chopped up into tiny pieces. My face spread across tomorrow's paper with some bullshit heading about me being a ray of sunshine and deeply missed by friends and family.

Truth was, I was closer to a storm cloud than a ray of anything. And no one would miss me. Except maybe Marisela. She'd also be the one most likely to show up to my funeral. If only to berate me for my tardiness.

I left the lights dimmed, all my focus directed at the open bedroom door as my chest rose and fell faster with each minute that stretched on. My lids were growing heavy, my muscles relaxing against the feel of the expensive sheets until I could sense myself slowly fading away as the first stages of sleep were taking over.

By the time I realized I wasn't alone anymore, it was too late. My eyes snapped open to a pitch-black room, my arms reaching out and trying to find purchase when a palm wrapped around my ankle and tugged me down the mattress. I slid with ease, the silk having a lot less traction than the cotton while leaving me nothing to grip. I blinked once, twice, then twice more. Trying to focus on the shadowy figure towering over me as slight recognition finally sank in.

"Grant?"

The question clung to the air, the figure neither confirming nor denying the accuracy as he ran a gloved hand along my collarbone. Over the peak of my right nipple, stiffened beneath the thin fabric of the camisole. Down my stomach, pausing when my breaths quickened, only to continue until the leather fingertips skimmed the waistband of the sleep shorts he demanded I wear. Then clearly decided I shouldn't as he yanked the material down my legs and tossed it across the room, the hood of his jacket making it impossible for me to see his face even as he lowered it between my thighs and buried his nose against my slick pussy. But I didn't have to see him to identify who it was. The way my body reacted to that first swipe of his tongue told me everything I needed to know.

I wasn't being stalked by some psycho killer looking to prop my head up on his living room mantel. I was being haunted by the ghost of the man who gave me the first orgasm I had in months. The guy who was too much of a pussy to break things off with me the next day. To face me and even tell me why. Another glorified dine and dasher.

I should have been annoyed. I wanted to be infuriated. But my brain was barely tethered to the rest of me as nerve endings I didn't even know I had thrummed to life. My head tipped back and digging into the mattress. My toes curling and my hips grinding against his jaw while he worked my pussy as though he knew it better than I did. Which didn't seem too far from the truth right now. Because I sure as fuck never made myself feel like this. And neither did my vibrator.

He was a mix of rough and gentle. Fast and slow. Calculated and sloppy. As he devoured me like I was both his first and last meal. Silently. But his actions no less ferocious than a starved man lapping up the sticky remnants of an empty soup bowl. He refused to waste a drop, his large hands spreading me wide and his frenzied breaths adding to the stimulation each time he exhaled through his nose.

I was rising higher and higher by the second, my muscles pulling tight like an overextended rubber band begging for release. At the same time, I didn't want it to end. I was both racing to the finish line and dragging my feet the closer it got. I knew it was hopeless though. I couldn't hold back, no matter how much I resisted. No matter how hard I tried to prolong the feel of his tongue flicking my clit at just the right rhythm. His gloved palms pressing into my thighs and his mouth adding the perfect mixture of suction and pressure. Until I had no choice but to give in to wave after wave of pleasure that had my body convulsing and the strangled sounds vibrating my vocal cords as I gasped and groaned in equal measure.

And then I was putty in his hands, my new sheets soaked through to the mattress with a combination of saliva and the aftermath of my orgasm, while the air was tinged with the familiar scent of one-sided sex.

An outcome that was his doing, not mine, by the way.

I had no problem returning the favor. In fact, I enjoyed giving head. Especially when the dick was pretty and clean enough to suck. He smelled freshly showered and my tongue was dying to know what he tasted like. Every part of him. But when I managed enough strength to lift my head off the bed, Grant was gone. The bedroom door pressed tight against the frame even though I'd never heard it click closed.

Well, fuck you too. Or I guess not.